Slovenian Administrative Court Confirms IPO Should Accept SPC Recalculation Requests

The Slovenian Supreme Court recently published five decisions by the Slovenian Administrative Court from June and July 2018, stating that the Slovenian Intellectual Property Office (SIPO) should accept supplementary protection certificate (SPC) term recalculation requests from holders of SPCs issued before June 4, 2013, provided that the SPC has not expired.

Prior to June 4, 2013, SIPO calculated SPC duration by interpreting “the date of the first authorization to place the product on the market” in Article 13(1) of the SPC Regulation as the date of the European Commission’s decision granting the marketing authorization. However, on June 4, 2013, in its Decision No. I U 846/2012-8, the Administrative Court stated that the date to be used for SPC term calculation should be the date the applicant is notified of the marketing authorization approval.

Following this decision, SIPO changed its SPC term calculation practice, but rejected all requests for recalculation of the duration of SPCs granted before this date. Several rights holders filed lawsuits against SIPO’s rejection with the Administrative Court, which issued its final decisions in June and July 2018.

SIPO now accepts SPC term recalculation requests, provided that the SPC has not expired, and issues decisions within a few days from the request filing date.

The Administrative Court’s decision comes after a December 2017 decision by the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) stating that holders of valid SPCs may request the recalculation of their SPC duration if this duration was calculated using the date of the decision granting the marketing authorization.

By: Maja Žnidarič

For more information, please contact Maja Žnidarič at our Slovenia office.